I haven’t read anything by her for a while, but I’ve re-read several of her book. The first books of hers I read were the Dragon Prince trilogy. It’s the first of two trilogies that complete the series, the second is called the Dragon Star trilogy. The books in order are The Dragon Prince, The Star Scroll, Sunrunner’s Fire, then Stronghold, The Dragon Token and lastly Skybowl. It’s a pretty epic series like the Wheel of Time, but not similar in writing or anything, just in the feel of the mammoth plot.

The characters are very well rounded and even the bad guys you kind of come to empathize with because of the detail she goes into. But that doesn’t in any way make what they do acceptable, it just makes their actions logical, or at least you can see how they came to their decisions. I’ve read some books that had a really weird feel cause the author wasn’t very good at character detail and background, so when a character did something it felt weird because you knew nothing about them to be able to know if they would or wouldn’t have realistically done it. But then there are some authors like Robert Jordan who can bog you down in to much detail, the books are still good, but who really cares if the old abandoned farm house has some moss growing in a corner, it’s not relevant to the plot. Sure some people say that’s nice, it allows you to get in the world more, but as far as I’m concerned the best authors in the world can paint you a vivid picture with very few words. Kurt Vonnegut for instance, none of his books are long at all, but the amount of info that he conveys is immense.

The world is very detailed with an interesting magic system. I’ve found I like new or different takes on magic, I find it very appealing and refreshing. This one, the mages have elemental control, but their power is obtained through the sun, moon and stars. But the most commonly used is the sun, hence Sunrunners. The description of how it’s used is that they can travel on the suns rays to communicate and to look at things far away. The only limitation is cloud cover, if your path is inadvertently cut off from where their mind is to their body your mind is lost or essentially their consciousness. And the description of them weaving the sunlight creates this incredible stained glass window image in your head.

The series of hers that is my favorite is called the Exiles. Though the third book hasn’t been published yet. This series also has an interesting magic system and lore. I’m personally big on mythology and lore of ancient cultures so I appreciate when an author puts some time into theirs.

The first book is called The Ruins of Ambrai, and it follows 3 sisters who don’t their sisters at first. There is so much that goes on that it’s kind of difficult to sum up in a paragraph or two. XD The second is The Mageborn Traitor and the third, The Captal’s Tower. But the third book isn’t out yet.